HELP IS ON THE WAY.....

....FINALLY

A 40' SHIPPING CONTAINER HEADED TO ST. VINCENT AND THE GRENADINES

Valuable Surplus Medical Supplies, Laptop Computers for Kids, Catholic High School Laboratory Equipment and Chapel Furnishings.

Medical Supplies for the two orphanages, three hospitals, nursing home and mental hospital.



Laptop computers for kids and two computer camps this summer.



Our beautiful chairs for the new chapel all lined up and ready to go.



Donated lab equipment from Spalding and Bellarmine Universities here in Louisville to one of the Catholic High Schools down in the Diocese of Kingstown SVG.



Our friend, Teresa Campbell of Brown-Forman Cooperage, oversees the loading of 60 donated chairs to be used in the new Saint James Chapel in the Kingstown Pastoral Centre in SVG.



Loading in progress.



Nice hospital beds



Thanks to my seminary classmate, Paul Bluel, who helped so much with all the paper work that it takes to carry off a project like this.



Wheel chairs, crutches, scales and IV poles.



Infant warmer and EKG machines and other equipment.





Getting as much in as possible, including walkers.



Everything you can see stacked against the wall, and a whole lot more, went into the container: rubber gloves, blood pressure cuffs, bandages, needles, surgical equipment and a host of other needed equipment by the cases.




Fifteen desk office desk chairs were donated by J R ARCHITECTS of Louisville.








Several more pallets like this one were loaded.



Getting toward the end of a full container.



Local news coverage.



The team of packers.



Almost ready to roll.



Applying the seal to prevent tampering.




That's a whole lot of help going to SVG.  It will go by truck to the railroad. By railroad it will go to the port of Savannah. From Savannah it will go by ship to SVG .It should arrive in SVG the first week of June.




We could not have done it without the dedication and hard work of Tim Tomes.
He went above and beyond the call of duty.

HOLDING GRUDGES

                                            HOLDING GRUDGES

                                 

FROM THE RECORD, May 11, 2017

Wrath and anger are hateful things, yet a sinner holds them tight.

Sirach 27:30

There is something I haven’t been able to get out of my mind since Christmas and that is how many families could not get together and enjoy one another’s company because of grudge holding A grudge is a persistent feeling of ill will or resentment resulting from a past insult or injury. Maybe it’s because I am around a lot of families during the holidays, but it seems that I hear about so many situations where it wrecks the holiday peace for so many. I point out to my brothers and sisters just how lucky we are not to have that problem.

Grudge holding is one human behavior that I find very curious. Because it does more damage to the one holding it than it does to the one it is held against, grudge holding amounts to convincing oneself that you can hurt someone back by continuing to hurt yourself. “I’ll show you! I’ll hurt me!” It’s like killing yourself because your girlfriend left you to get even with her. Holding onto a grudge is like holding a hot coal with the intent of throwing it at someone else: you are the one who gets burned.

In carrying a grudge, the degree of resentment is usually out of proportion to the insult or injury. It is often something very small that has been nursed and cuddled till it becomes larger than life! At the core of a grudge, you will probably find a fear that is unowned. It could be a fear of not being good enough, a fear of not being secure enough or a fear of not being all that one appears to be that the original slight exposed.

I have always found that the best way to head off grudges is to lower one’s expectations of loved ones and let them be who they are! Yes, we may need to let them be outrageous, inconsistent and even inconsiderate at times in hopes that they will return the favor someday.

When we “expect” those we love to do what we want, act like we want, say what we want – and they don’t - we set ourselves up for disappointment that can lead to grudge-holding. Thomas Merton was right. “The beginning of love is to let those we love be perfectly themselves, and not to twist them to fit our own image. Otherwise, we love only the reflection of ourselves we find in them.”

Carrying a grudge is a choice, a self-righteous, self-defeating, pride-filled choice between simply being “right” and having a sister, brother, mother, father or friend as part of one’s life. Instead of choosing to have a whole family, a grudge-carrier choose to have a family with a hole in it! Choosing a response that is so “wrong” is a high price to pay for that need to be “right.”